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Friday, 9 May 2014

Vegan Hastings

Last weekend (May bank holiday), we went to Hastings. I was born in Hastings and we have friends down there, so it's always nice to go back - and we generally do, once a year, for the May Day celebrations. There is a wonderful Jack in the Green festival held down there - it's a lot of fun!

We usually end up eating the same sort of thing while we're down there but this time we had some new experiences - I do love discovering new vegan places! My mum and sister are leaning towards turning vegan, so I think that was an added incentive to look for some vegan food.

The first place we visited was called Land of Green Ginger, and can be found on the High Street in the Old Town. It is a pretty little cafe which I've noticed before but never been into - the name always struck me as somewhere that sounds vegan friendly! It turns out they have a good selection of vegan dishes, and a lovely garden area that you would never expect to find in such a small cafe:

The homemade bubble was lovely, as was the onion gravy (although there was a lot of it!) and I guess you can't go wrong with some Linda McCartney sausages. After seeing the falafel dish that my sister ordered though, I wish I'd picked that! I think it was just because it was a warm sunny day, and sausages and gravy seem like more of a winter warmer. That being said, it was a very good meal and I'm always happy when I see clearly labelled vegan options!

The second place I want to mention is one of the food stalls that was at the Jack in the Green festival - Whambam. I ate from here last year but I don't think I blogged about it. This stall was very popular - I'd been in the queue for about half an hour before I was close enough to take this photo!

Whambam serve a selection of bhajis and pakoras, all of which are vegan and gluten free - they even grind their own flour! The food is freshly made at the stall, and you can see it all being chopped and prepared in front of you. You can opt for a small or large tray, with 2 or 3 sauces depending on which one you choose. Mr Hatter and I went for a large tray each as we were rather hungry by this point!

This is my large tray, full of bhajis and pakoras (although I wasn't lucky enough to get any cauliflower this year!), with mild mango chutney, hot mango chutney, and not-so-hot lime pickle (which was still pretty hot). It was £6 well spent, as it kept me full well into the evening!

So if you're a vegan in Hastings, you have options. And I'm sure there are many more that I haven't yet explored! I shall be hunting them out when I'm down there next year. (I know of at least one more vegan place that I have to try but haven't been able to yet - 1066 Cake Stand. They have two vegan kitchens, one of which is gluten free, and they bake a variety of sweet and savoury treats. I was lucky enough to be able to sample their cinder toffee in box number 4 from The Vegan Kind.

To finish off, here's a picture of us in our green outfits, ready for the bank holiday celebrations:

And this is our spoils from the arcades (because you can't go to the seafront and not play on the arcades apparently...) - Mr Hatter is pretty good at the grabber machines!